Fox sues Smartmatic over poll claim

WASHINGTON: Fox News sued Smartmatic for allegedly exaggerating how much financial damage resulted from false reports that the voting technology company had rigged the 2020 election against thenpresident Donald Trump.

The complaint, filed on Thursday in New York state court, widens a legal battle that began last year when Smartmatic brought a US$2.7 billion (89.9 billion baht) defamation suit against Fox for repeatedly airing unverified claims by Mr Trump and others of a vast conspiracy to flip votes away from him.

Fox now alleges in a so-called counterclaim that Smartmatic’s lawsuit falsely asserted that the voting technology company “stood to make nearly $2 billion in annual revenue in 2025”. According to Fox, that’s more than four times Smartmatic’s highest reported revenues within the past nine years.

“But more fanciful still, Smartmatic insists that these phantom losses are all attributable not to the coverage of the President’s allegations against it, but to a handful of segments on Fox News,” the outlet said in the filing. “That claim does not pass the straight-face test.”

Mr Trump and his supporters have continued to push his conspiracy theory despite it being widely debunked by US intelligence officials and judges who tossed out Republican challenges to the election results. The falsehood ultimately helped trigger the riot at the Capitol on Jan 6 last year.

“It is ironic that Fox claims that Smartmatic’s lawsuit is without basis after the court found that the lawsuit had a substantial basis in law and fact,” Smartmatic attorney Erik Connolly said. “The decisions of courts across the country regarding these defamatory statements speak for themselves.”

Fox claims the exaggerations violate New York’s Anti Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation statute which bars cases intended to chill free speech.